


Synecdoche

by violetkareninas



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: AU sort of??, F/M, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-14
Updated: 2016-04-14
Packaged: 2018-06-02 07:30:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6557365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/violetkareninas/pseuds/violetkareninas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-s2. Six months after Karen Page saw Frank Castle on a rooftop for what she thought was the last time, she should have really learned to expect the unexpected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Synecdoche

The white screen of a blank document lit up the screen of one, Karen Page's laptop as she sat, eyes sleepily propped open with her fourth cup of coffee, chin in hands, brow furrowed. A small sigh escaped her pursed lips and she frowned. This was getting ridiculous. The time on the digital clock in the corner of her screen burned a white-hot neon '22:40' into her retinas. It was long past any sociable or acceptable time to be working, long past any time that she should have still been in the office and yet - here she was. Funny, how such a innocuous thing like a blank page could be so frustrating. Her mind instantly flitted to the scotch from Christmas that lay, unopened, in a desk draw which her leg was currently resting against.

  
Should she?

  
The thought, unbidden yet not unwelcome, rose to the top of her mind like grey froth on a choppy sea of words and ideas she couldn't seem to get down onto the page in front of her. This was an occurrence that had started to happen far too often for her liking. For the third time in the last six months since the shit-storm, hurricane of a man that was Frank Castle had hit Hell's Kitchen; since Matt Murdock had crumpled back the brown paper bag to reveal that crimson devil-horned helmet; since she had nearly been gunned down twice, somehow writing about anything vigilante related had become a hell of a lot harder.

  
Matt had, of course, told her everything. His truth about his blindness, how long he'd been Daredevil, how Foggy had covered for him on numerous occasions ("I always knew that man was too good for you" she had spluttered out, a smile coating her mouth as worn and vibrant as yesterday's lipstick), who that woman had been in his bed the night she had called to check on him (of course she'd researched who Elektra was after they'd parted ways) amongst a vast array of other things. The conversation had lasted until the early hours of the morning; one that remained instilled into her memory, even if it was one she swore never to tell anyone.

  
And then life had simply resumed, almost as if nothing had happened.

  
Time, it seemed, had no concept of tragedy or loss or danger in Hell's Kitchen; it stopped for no-one. If it did, she thought with a grim smile quirking her lips, New York would never move. Perhaps that was why they called it the city that never slept. There was nothing else to do but simply continue on. So, she returned to writing articles at the Bulletin full-time, and with her first proper pay check had used it to spruce up her office a little. Despite everything that had happened, the words 'Karen Page; journalist' was a phrase she was still coming to terms with, ever since she had stepped into it six months prior with questions on her lips and a burning desire to get to the bottom of a mystery that had now been solved. Still, that didn't stop her from being thankful for the use of AC when the summer heat over the past few days had gotten too much to bear.

  
And then there was the matter of Frank Castle.

  
Since seeing him on the rooftop almost six months ago, after Matt had fought a whole hoard of Ninjas, and how he'd described how Frank had helped, shooting them down as though they were 'ducks at a fair' he had said, she hadn't heard or seen a single piece of evidence relating to his whereabouts. Naturally, there had been speculation, numerous false sightings, and more arrests that she could count or even cared to keep track of; all understandable as he was, after all, a wanted criminal; a man who had escaped justice and one of New York's highest security prisons; a man who probably belonged behind bars and deserved to stay there. But not a psychopath. She had kept the article of a house fire, a small note in the back section of a newspaper from six months ago under a paperweight on her desk. The ink was long past faded, the picture gone. No-one has asked.  
Quietly, publically even, she was pleased that he'd gone off grid. With a target as big as the Empire State on his back the last thing she wanted to see was his face plastered across every newspaper in town, including her own. Privately, she ignored the tugging feeling in her gut every time the word Punisher came up into conversation; and the feeling that the next time she'd see him would probably be when things were getting really bad. That was if he'd come back at all.

  
If she was worried, she'd become pretty good at hiding it.

  
Flicking her gaze to the time again, the neon numbers now read 22: 47. Still, a blank document stared back at her; if white pages could mock she was fairly sure that was what it was doing. In a swift movement, she shut the lid and leaned back in her chair, tired eyes scanning her office listlessly, as though searching for something.And then - Her eyes stopped. A note, one she hadn't seen before, was wedged under her door. It wasn't long before she was up out of her seat, crouched on the floor, opening the note (a scrappy, folded sheet of paper in an old envelope sealed with a pink pig sticker) and -

  
_Check the news tomorrow._  
_9am._  
_You'll want to see this._

_F._

  
Her blood ran cold.  
  


-:-

  
The static on her mobile phone crackled into life as she sat in the driver's seat, street lights flitting past her, refracting off the dirt spattered windows. Heat settled on the pavement like a thick layer of dust, the kind that stuck.  
_Pickuppickuppickup._  
Nothing.

  
"Hi, this is Matt Murdock. I'm sor--"

  
She hung up and flung her phone on the seat next to her.

  
-:-

  
_"Early reports are saying that it was a combined effort from prison inmates--"_  
_"unconfirmed body count--"_  
_"-- a whole two blocks destroyed--"_  
_"lockdown--"_

  
The ringing of her phone on her desk did little to cut through the din that was the Bulletin office. The news, all unconfirmed was pouring in thick and fast; a gas explosion near a police precinct, criminals escaping; all in the same time a high-max prisons security failed, a prison containing Wilson Fisk of all people. Matt still hadn't answered her call from last night. Is this what the letter had meant?

  
Nevertheless, it was one she instantly moved to pick up the moment it moved.

  
"Karen?"  
"Foggy."

  
There was an audible sigh on the other end of the line, one which she matched.

  
"Are you watching the news?" His voice no longer carried the usual jovial tone. Instead he sounded tired, tetchy even. Background noise assailed her ears. She frowned.  
"Yeah, I am - Foggy, are you driving?"

  
"No. But if you mean to say am I'm being driven mad then yes. If you don't hear from me in a few hours, it's because Hogarth's got my head on a silver platter somewhere."  
Despite herself a small smirk lined her mouth. "That bad, huh?"

  
"Yeah. You know, this is almost making me miss food for legal advice deal we had. Sometimes all the paychecks in the world can't make up for some peach cobbler when shit hits the fan."A pause, one that she felt stretched on for too long until he spoke again."You haven't heard from Matt, have you?" Her voice was low now in reply, hushed as though someone might overhear. "He wasn't out last night was he?" Another sigh sounded from her phone, and she frowned in response. Of course she should have known not to ask. "I don't know." Foggy replied, the noise in the background now getting louder. "He's not exactly been in complete contact with me lately."

  
"Me too."

  
There was a pause, the lull in conversation bringing back the news that was blaring out on the TV screen in the hallway; "--several inmates dead, more escaped, unconfirmed sightings of a-". This time as she replied her voice picked up pace as she spoke. It was more than just a coincidence, it was a piece of evidence pointing to a picture, one that she had no idea what it looked like. But she had to tell someone. "Okay because-I- I got a letter last night." She swallowed, pausing before her next sentence. Her heart felt like it was going to leap out of her chest and skitter across the floor. "Telling me to check the news, I-"

  
Another beat.

  
"Foggy, I think Frank Castle's back in Hell's Kitchen."

  
-:-

**Author's Note:**

> First time writing anything Marvel/Daredevil related, but I am complete Kastle trash and really wanted to write something for them!!! /flails like a tiny Octopus.


End file.
